Why is a rapid heartbeat and high blood pressure from exercise healthy for your cardio system, but the same effects from drugs like alcohol and nicotine cause damage?
In: Biology
Alcohol damages your liver, and you get high blood pressure because has [A LOT of blood pass through](https://www.sgihealth.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/liver-disease-71.jpg) it to be processed, and if it’s damaged there’s basically back-pressure that increases your overall blood pressure.
Lungs also have major blood vessels going through them, and smoking decreases the efficiency of your red blood cells transferring oxygen and carbon dioxide as you breathe, so your body detects the lower levels of oxygen and makes your heart pump faster, to get more oxygen going to the cells in your body.
Different causes, but basically both are abnormal (not usual) instances of high blood pressure, and more importantly they’re chronic (long term, not just a few minutes after you’ve exercised), so they cause strain / damage to the heart too.
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